


(not quite) written in stone.

by neotheatre (orphan_account)



Category: The Sisters Grimm - Michael Buckley
Genre: F/M, HE ISNT BETTER YET I SWEAR HES GOING TO GET THERE, I simply think atticus deserved to be better, Oh lore?, Self-Indulgent, UPDATE HE KILLED MORE PEOPLE AJDHANSGA, and that's p long hfkfh, atticus isn't completely bad (at first), atticus kills people, based off the original rose red and snow white tale, but like, he deserved a redemption arc, it's going to span rose-reds entire timeline, might be a while between chapters, tw for implicated abuse, tw for vague description of murder, updating as i get motivation!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-28
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-07 15:54:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26700217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/neotheatre
Summary: hello sisters grimm fandom and welcome to my awfully thought out lore containing rose-red and snow-white and atticus and william
Relationships: Atticus Charming & Rose Red, Atticus Charming/Snow White, Prince Charming & Snow White, Prince Charming/Snow White (The Sisters Grimm)
Comments: 9
Kudos: 5





	1. Chapter 1

the first time she meets him, they're all practically children.   
  
they're barely fifteen, living in a cottage just pinpointing the start of the woods. they've made by, living off only what they needed. it was a dull life, sure, but rose-red had her sister at least. rose had wanted to go outside _all day_ , begging her sister to take a break from the chores and go play in the snow that covered what seemed to be everything.  
  
she was knocked out of her thoughts of leaving the house by a loud knock at the door. rose-red and snow-white looked to each other, and then the door. rose ran to open the door before snow could peer out the window and see who it was. the last person she suspected to be at the door was a large, scary-looking bear. well, maybe not the last thing. the last thing she suspected to be behind it was a large, scary-looking bear that opens its mouth to say that he's almost frozen, and simply wants to stay in front of their fireplace, just for the night.  
  
rose-red is so, so scared. she never was the one who made good decisions, so when her sister nudged her aside to nod politely and open the door completely, she let it happen. she watches with wide eyes as the bear walks to the fire, sitting down just as he said he wanted to. she doesn't tear her eyes from him, even as her sister comes in with two brooms, handing one to her. rose grips the broom tightly, her knuckles turning white. she watches as her sister starts beating and sweeping the snow off the bear, letting out a laugh as the absurdity of the scene gets to her.   
  
she walks up, doing exactly as her sister does. the bear gives her a not-exactly-a-smile, baring it's teeth in a way that didn't seem to be intended to scare her. (though it did. not that she'd admit it.) her sister quickly warms up to the bear, talking to him once the snow on him is gone. rose watches, a fleeting thought in her mind about how usually she's the one who talks to strangers and snow is the one who wonders if they should be doing so.  
  
she hasn't been paying attention, she realizes, zoning back in just to catch her sister asking a question.  
  
"how'd you get like this, atticus?"  
  
that must be his name. atticus. she thinks it's fitting.  
  
the bear— atticus shakes his head, large jaw opening wide in a yawn that causes his entire body to go taut.   
  
"that's not a story for now."  
  
the rest of the night seems to go by in a flash, surprisingly. atticus got situated in front of the fire and the girls went to the back of the cottage where their cots were, changing into their sleeping clothes. rose slept surprisingly well for someone with a bear in their house, drifting off after a small conversation with snow-white about how exciting it was that they "got a new visitor, one who seemed like he wanted to be their friend."  
  
and it happens again. every night, atticus returns, they talk, they sleep. he's always gone by the time they wake up, never leaving more than a damp spot on the floor where the snow melted from the fire. that entire winter, every night, that becomes their routine. they talk about everything, from snow-white and rose-reds life to atticus' treasure, that he has to guard from a vile dwarf once the weather takes a turn. it's peaceful and nice while it lasts.   
  
one night, though, when there's barely any snow on the ground and it's officially starting to thaw out, he doesn't come back. that night is one snow-white and rose-red don't sleep. they sit at the front window and hope and wait for him to come back. he doesn't.   
  
  
the second time she meets him, she doesn't actually meet _him, she_ meets something she'd only heard him talk about.  
  
rose-red and snow-white were out on a walk. they'd been trapped inside for the last few days, the chores having piled up since winter started and they couldn't do much outside. the sun was shining down on them, a loving warmth settling across roses body. the sounds of struggle meet her ears and she goes running off towards it, leaving snow-white to shout at her to come back.  
  
(she doesn't want to admit it, even to herself, but she wants it to be atticus.)  
  
when she is met with the sight of a dwarf, his beard caught in the tangle of tree branches just near the ground. he's shouting and rose just stands, watching him with a disappointed look on her face. it's only when snow-white comes tumbling near her that the dwarf even realizes that there's anyone there, turning around and opening his mouth to shout at them. snow-white doesn't give him the chance, cutting him off to ask if he needs any help. he shakes his head indignantly, scowling at the two girls.   
  
rose-red rolls her eyes, able to catch on to when someone is hard headed. she leans down, pulling off her shoe and grabbing out the blade she keeps beneath the sole of it. she walks up to the dwarf, completely ignoring his yelling of words that were most certainly not kind. she cuts off part of his beard, choppily and quickly, walking back over to her sister as the dwarf starts shouting _again_. he yells about how they shouldn't just go around cutting things up like that, how he had it covered himself, and how he was going to get out without their help.   
  
rose-red pulls snow-white away, not wanting to listen to the livid man one second longer. he doesn't follow them, much to her relief.   
  
this isn't the last time it happens. throughout the summer they help him out constantly, whether it be from getting caught again or from climbing trees and being unable to climb down.  
  
the second time she meets him, she comes to an awful realization.  
  
one day, a day rose just knows is going to have that awful dwarf shouting at them in it, rose hears a noise she hadn't for months. the sound of a loud snarl, though the only times she had heard it was playfully, not full of malice and ill-intent as it was heard here. she ran with her sister towards it, entering a clearing in the woods just in time to see a bear and the dwarf, but not just any bear, they definitely recognized this one and the scar over one of its paws and the tiniest piece taken out of one of its ears.   
  
this was atticus, and he was angry.  
  
rose-red could hear the dwarfs cries as he realized they were there. he was begging for his life, she realized. he knew that atticus was angry, and somehow, he knew that atticus had drastically been wronged by him. neither snow-white nor rose-red had any time to make it across the clearing as they watched atticus reel back one of his arms, striking the dwarf down and instantly killing the man as he hit the ground. at the same time, atticus got shorter. and less hairier. and _human_. he was clothed, his eyes wide as he realized that he was no longer a beast.  
  
rose-red realizes something. she realizes that atticus took a life. that the form laying on the ground in front of his larger-than-life person was recently living. that atticus had killed.  
  
she barely has time to make it to the bushes before she gets sick.  
  
within the next week, her life is completely changed. snow-white and atticus start courting, and rose-red is left with atticus' younger brother, andreas. she hated him, so, so much. he was exactly like her, and she saw this as competition. they were alike down to their behavior, being the younger sibling, charismatic, able to talk their way out of anything. she hated him.   
  
by the time she meets andreas charming, she and her sister are just sixteen, past the age at which most girls started courting. to be clear, rose had no interest at _all of_ being anything close to william. but she did have interest in making her sister happy, and if her sister thought that rose and william were the perfect match, she'd put up with him.   
  
snow-white was the perfect girl, quiet, no temper, loving. it was no wonder atticus wouldn't like her. rose-red on the other hand? was truly her mother's daughter. outspoken, intimidating, charismatic. she had no clue why andreas would even entertain the idea of courting her, but if snow was going to be happy because of it, she wasn't going to question it.

rose-red was happy. she really was, she was content to stay with andreas and his quirks. like how he'd always repeat "okay" two or three times, and how every night before he went to bed he'd put out his bedside candle by licking his index finger and thumb and pressing them to the flame, always almost burning himself but never quite.

she loves him in that life. she loves him so much it makes her heart ache just thinking about him. she boards the new beginning with him and her sister and atticus, ready to make a new life. she moves into fairyport landing with him, getting a job as a bartender for the only bar in town. she loves him and she loves her life. but all good things come to an end eventually. 

her mother comes to her, late at night, rose-red is mourning the loss of her sister. snow-white died by the hand of atticus charming in a little cottage on the edge of town. the body was found by rose when she had gone for her usual dinner date, only to find that atticus was refusing to let her in. she forced her way through and looked through the house, finding her sister dead in the bathtub. 

she barely has time to make it to the toilet before she gets sick.

her head is still spinning as she pushes atticus out of the way again, running out of the home and going straight to her mother. she doesn't know where else to go, who else would believe her. atticus has the entirety of fairyport wrapped around his finger. 

bunny tells rose about the book of everafter and rose hates it. she doesn't like the thought that her reality isn't set in stone. she doesn't like that her entire being could be changed. she agrees to help anyways. 

she says goodbye to her husband though he doesn't completely understand. he tells her he isn't going anywhere. she wishes that were true.


	2. #2

she is only semi-aware that this is not her first go at this fable. flashes of memory, the feeling she has said these things, performed these actions, aware only in fleeting thoughts that pass her mind. when she sees atticus charming for the first time it all comes together. she has met this man before, she knows it. she has gone through this and she knows how it ends and she knows on that last day of winter, deep in her heart, that though he did not return, she will see him again. 

every warm summer day she cherishes, the feeling of having lived this already dulled by the feeling that comes every summer of repeating endless days.

that is, until she sees the dwarf. the moment she hears the shouts she almost grabs snow-whites wrist and turns around. she should. she should grab her sister and leave. she doesn't.

she watches as she and her sister go through the motions of helping out the angry man, feeling as if she's a bystander to the scene unfolding. reality is shattering beneath her fingertips. she tries her best to reel it in, not breakdown in front of her sister and some stranger. she'll think about it later. now is not the time. 

she grabs her pocket knife, cutting through the dwarfs beard, her vision flickering between memory and reality, not that it makes a difference. everything is exactly the same.

everything is exactly the same, right down to the way she rolls her eyes, the way the grabs her sister and pulls her out of the clearing, the way those shouts and yells and mean words are coming towards her. this is the first time rose thinks she might have made a mistake.

rose knows she has to love atticus this time around. (it doesn't make it any easier.) she knows it's not going to be right. it's okay though, she has her sister this time around. so when atticus comes back, she loves him. not in the way she loved andreas, but as a close friend, expressing it in the way couples do. she courts him, having to act like every time her hand is intertwined with his or she meets his eyes and sees the loving look in them is doesn't scream **wrong, wrong, wrong, danger, danger, danger.** she has to do this, she tells herself, for snow-white.

in the next life, andreas is not the same.

he does not have the same name. he is not the same man. he is nothing like her husband. rose-red hates him for it. the ache she feels when she looks at andreas, or william now, isn't as bad as it was the first time she looked at him and didn't see the man she truly loved looking back, especially when snow-white just looks so happy. she never runs out of tales to tell rose at night of what william did this time, or what william said earlier. everytime she hears the name of this stranger her chest feels tighter and tighter. the ache in her heart grows bitter and cold and stabbing, reminding her of why she has to do this. it doesn't make it any less bearable.

rose-red does it again. she marries atticus, she boards the ship to a new life, she gets a job, she survives. this time around, she doesn't truly live. she left her soul in the meadows her sister and herself would walk through on spring afternoons, among the wildflowers and untamed trees and the light breezes that brought the sound of chimes and flutes from places she did not know the origin of. 

she handles it. she handles atticus' temper and the way he moves too quickly when he's angry for her to really feel safe. she handles the sleepless nights in his arms where she is almost able to pretend they're her andreas'. she handles it and she keeps it hidden and she doesn't let anyone see it. rose-red doesn't understand how her sister did it. she goes to her mother, not even needing to explain what's happened. she doesn't know if bunny will change this, or if this is the story that will stay in books forever. she does not truthfully care at this point, this life has been the worst out of all two she's been through. she says goodbye to her sister and is grateful it's taken merely as an end to their get-together that day.

when she dies, she feels sorry for her sister in her original life and how she hadn't realized what she'd gone through.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello i got my first comment here and fucking screamed y'all >___< losing my goddamn mind. this updates as i get motivation btw! so it might be a while between chapters.... it's more of a mix of explaining my lore and self projecting into a character than anything but i am so glad some people enjoy this :3


	3. #3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hello! this has a tw for described ch//king (o) near the end. if you're sensitive to this, please skip this chapter! thank you :]

rose knows from a young age that there is something missing from her life. she can feel it in her bones, screaming at her to find it. whether “it” is a person or event, shes unsure, but she knows she needs it like she needs air to breathe. her position working for the charmings is that of maid, specifically atticus’ personal maid starting when she turns ten. she’s lived with her mother, yet another maid, for her entire life. she’s known atticus since birth and she positively hates him. she hates the way he’s coldhearted and treats her awfully, hates the way he returned from his disappearance for over a year and hates the way he returned with a girl that is so, so very familiar. 

the other charming brother is far more agreeable. his name is william, and rose-red thinks he has the most beautiful smile, even if his attitude isn’t that great. rose thinks that maybe, if things had been different, she could’ve loved him. 

when atticus brings home snow-white, it all clicks for rose. why she’s been putting up with atticus, why she hasn’t simply left this place, why she hasn’t just gone already. it’s all been for her, all for snow-white. even when she remembers how she loved william, how she gave him up the second time. even when she remembers how cruel and greedy atticus is, how she’s sacrificed everything for her sister, she doesn harbor any sour feelings for snow-white. 

she’s so very afraid of living more lives, of remembering century upon century of rerun of the same events, knowing someone will have to die for the cycle to start again. she shoves down her fear, putting it in the very back of her mind, knowing today isn’t the right day for it.

atticus charming has turned 17 and everyone is celebrating. the high class, not knowing just how awful he truthfully is, had come to attend a party in honor of him. it’s after hours and the air is thick, the imposing feeling of the night and the loneliness of the dining hall choking her. 

everyone else has gone to bed, only rose-red is still up, wandering the halls of the castle. she runs her fingertips across smooth marble, the feeling in the pit of her stomach growing bigger and bigger as the minutes pass. there are eyes on her. the hair on the back of her neck stands up and a prickling feeling in her head grows as she continues to ignore it. this is a mistake.

she feels his footsteps before she hears them, the water in the flower vase on the table shaking and moving. she wonders, all too late, why it's rippling and moving. she frowns, and moves to hold it still, still not thinking.

her body hits the floor before she can feel it. adrenaline prevents her from feeling her cracked wrist as she looks to see prince atticus charming where she was standing just a moment ago. she doesn't process it as he grabs her, forcing her to her feet as he almost growls at her.

"what are you doing still out here?"

she blanks, mouth opening and closing as she grasps for an excuse. it's still too late, his fingers digging into her arms hard enough to leave crescent-shaped marks.

she shakes her head, trying to ask something, anything, to figure out why he's so angry. too late, again, she doesn't process his movement until his hands are around her throat and her heads turning to static, full of cotton and greytones and stars dancing across her vision until everything goes to black. her last thought is a simple one, 'i wish i would've looked back earlier.'


End file.
